OCTOBER 3 • 2024 | 7
J
N

Levi Strauss invented a jean 
company in 1853 that Beyoncé 
just wrote a banger about.
So, if Jewish people provide 
so much good and progress in 
the world, why are we eternally 
demonized and persecuted? 
In Mark Twain’s 1899 essay 
“Concerning the Jews,” he 
deduces that through centuries of 
economic exclusion “… the one 
tool which the law was not able 
to take from him [the Jew]— his 
brain — have made that tool 
singularly competent” and others 
were “unable to compete with the 
average Jew.”
David Wolpe, emeritus rabbi 
of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles 
and a scholar on antisemitism, 
states that “Jews committed the 
unforgivable act of introducing 
conscience to the world … for 
most of human history up to 
Sinai, what the gods cared about 
was how you treated them … The 
Ten Commandments said God 
cares about how you treat each 
other. And that call to conscience 
means a call to sin and guilt.”
Or maybe the answer is 
analogous to Lord Voldemort’s 
contempt of Harry Potter. As 
Dumbledore explains to Harry, 
“If there is one thing Voldemort 
cannot understand, it is love. He 
didn’t realize that love as powerful 
as your mother’s for you leaves 
its own mark … It was agony 
to touch a person marked by 
something so good.”
Sometimes, amid the whiplash 
of antisemitism, we become 
disoriented to the fact that this 
hate is not about us. The Jewish 
people have been, and will 
always be, a mirror reflecting 
the jealousy, self-loathing and 

bitterness in the souls of man. 
Oct. 7 was my painful 
orientation to this Jewish legacy. 
We are a nation destined to 
confront the worst of humanity 
and, in turn, understand the 
ultimate blessing of peace. 
Is this what it means to be 
God’s “chosen people?” To receive 
the highest highs and lowest lows? 
To be the intergenerational model 
of joy and grief? To, as Wolpe 
noted, be the eternal conscience 
of human morality? If there’s any 
proof of this, one must look to 
arguably the most evil human 
being in history: Adolf Hitler. 
An ounce of Jewish blood was 
a threat he could not tolerate. 
He said, “Conscience is a Jewish 
invention,” and he spent his life 
trying to destroy it by any means 
necessary.
So, if consciousness is the 
liberator of the human mind 
and murdering the Jews is the 
annihilation of consciousness, 
then destroying the Jews is the 
intentional destruction of self-
awareness. If the Jews are gone, 
the ability to know oneself is 
compromised. Objective reality 
would be subject to endless 
manipulation, and the inversion 
of truth would be sacrosanct. 
Progress and freedom would 
cease to exist. Kindness and love 
would lose their meaning. Good 
would disappear, and the light 
that guides nations would be 
extinguished.
If you destroy the Jews, you 
destroy yourself. If you destroy 
the Jews, you destroy the world. 

Daphna Shull is a writer, visual artist, musi-

cian and photographer who works as the 

creative producer for The Braid.

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2024

6:00PM STROLLING DINNER

7:30PM PROGRAM

Location to be provided upon registration

To register, please scan or visit

www.fidf.org/2024fidfminightofsolidarity/

For more information, please contact

michigan@fidf.org or 248.926.4110

Business Attire
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2024 NIGHT OF
SOLIDARITY

FIDF MICHIGAN

